Regarding the flap over Clemente High School’s use of Title I funding to involve community and cultural organizations in their school:
The last time I checked, citizens of Puerto Rico, regardless of their political affiliations, are full citizens of the United States and said affiliations are therefore protected under the Constitution. What “cultural and nationalist groups” do in their evening hours is their business, and fundraising, as Democrats and Republicans well know, is perfectly fine.
Jonathan Kozol and Donaldo Macedo were right: We are told time and again by experts that “throwing money into classrooms won’t help education,” and yet when an underprivileged school attempts to rise up, strengthen its bond and take its fate into its own hands, these same experts moan over the misuse of funds meant for “poor children.” How better to use funding for children than to defend them from forces of racist intrusion and instill in them a sense of pride and independence?
Local control of schools, it seems, is only a good thing if you’re a homeowner from Winnetka or Lake Forest, not if you live in a struggling community attempting to change your school from an indoctrination factory to a center for creative and critical thought. If the object of schools is to produce democratic-minded citizens, then Clemente and its community are doing its job. I wholeheartedly applaud their efforts and am appalled at the media fear-mongering in this affair.
